This Above All---A Girl Portrays Shakespeare's Romeo

This Above All by Lindsey Roth Culli is a  contemporary YA novel which is a potent stew of Shakespeare, gender, sexuality, religion and growing up in the American Midwest.   I received a free copy from the indie publisher, Curiosity Quills, in return for this honest review.

I have previously reviewed two other Curiosity Quills releases Alice Takes Back Wonderland, a rather wonderful fairy tale mashup and The Heartless City , an alternate history dystopia based on Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde which I found compelling and enjoyable.  I expected This Above All to be more conventional compared to those previous outings.  In some ways, it was very much like a standard YA novel, but in others it very definitely wasn't.

                               

The conventional aspect of this book was high school.   I tend to avoid YA novels that take place in high school.   Most of these have predictable character types, dynamics and plots.   This Above All contained those elements.  There were false rumors, bullying and relationships plagued by miscommunication.  Juliet was played by a stereotypical popular mean girl.  It seems that the director of this Romeo and Juliet didn't prioritize chemistry between the leads.

Sexuality was a theme, but This Above All didn't really focus on sexual relationships as is appropriate in a YA novel. While the specter of lesbianism fueled controversy, there was no actual lesbianism. Heterosexual romance played a role in the plot of this novel, but it wasn't predominant.   There was a gay character named Tony, but his life wasn't front and center either.  I read a review on Goodreads that was disappointed that we didn't find out more about Tony's family interactions.   Tony played Mercutio.  If it's true that Shakespeare needed to kill off Mercutio to prevent him from taking over the play, as is stated in this book, it's probably also true that Culli wanted to make certain that Tony didn't upstage Piper, her protagonist.

I felt that the way Piper deals with her real female identity while portraying a male role is the most interesting aspect of this book.  She initially had her doubts about whether she could or should be Romeo.  Yet once she became accustomed to the idea, she threw herself into her fictive male identity.   I wouldn't say that Piper is a transgender character.   It seemed to me that Culli wanted to show that it's possible for a girl to play with masculine gender traits in a theatrical context while still retaining a core self-concept of being female.  Piper has more in common with historical women who dressed as men to achieve career goals than with individuals who seek to transition to another gender.

Piper's fundamentalist Christian family brings religion into the mix of themes.  It is they who stir the cauldron of outrage over Piper playing a male role.  Her pastor father is shown as being sincerely concerned about Piper's spiritual well being.   As I am not a Christian myself, I wouldn't presume to make statements about the true nature of Christianity.   Over the course of the narrative, Piper changes her own views about religion.  She ponders how she can maintain a relationship with God, and comes to her own independent conclusions.   It seems to me that for Piper developing a personal approach to religion is part of the process of becoming an adult.

This Above All is a book that will cause readers to reflect on a number of topics, but I think they will also be moved by the courage of Piper and Tony, and the  chosen family they found in the cast of Romeo and Juliet.   As we have seen in the TV series, Glee, communities of performers can be powerful support systems for teens who feel like outsiders in a hostile world.  Anyone who has felt at odds with their families, or with society in general will be able to relate to Piper.




                               

The Burning Land Raises Interesting Questions in a Fantasy Context

The Burning Land is the second book I've read by Victoria Strauss.  I read and reviewed her historical fiction Color Song on this blog here .  I happen to be a fan of fantasy as well as historical fiction and the description of this one sounded like it might deal with interesting themes.  I received The Burning Land from the publisher via Net Galley in return for this honest review.

                                                   

Like another review that I recently saw on Goodreads, I originally thought that Victoria Strauss was re-creating Tibet and Tibetan Buddhism in a fantasy context.  There were indeed some parallels, but there were also some key differences.  The first one I noticed is that Strauss' fictional religion, Aratism, is messianic.  It's a central tenet of Buddhism that anyone can become a Buddha.  There are Bodhisattvas who strive to awaken others to their Buddha nature, but each Buddhist is actually still the one engaged in his or her own salvation.  So there are no messiahs in Buddhism. Another seriously critical difference between Tibetan Buddhism and Aratism is that Tibetan Buddhist monks practice non-violence.  The Brethren of Arata don't adhere to such a code.  In fact, violence among Aratists is central to the plot.  The sort of violence that occurs is reminiscent of historical conflicts between Christian sects. I came to the conclusion that Victoria Strauss has constructed a syncretic religion composed of elements from Buddhism and Christianity.  It's East meets West in a fantasy world.

The male and female protagonists are both complex.  Gyalo, the male protagonist, evolves in an unexpected direction while still maintaining the essence of his character.    I don't agree with the Goodreads reviewer who seemed to think that Axane, the female protagonist, had been "ruined" by traumatic events.  For me, the strength of a female character is demonstrated by how she reacts to trauma.  Axane is severely impacted by trauma, but she's a survivor.  She is eventually able to move on with her life.  I appreciate that sort of portrayal of a female character.

The fantasy aspect involves paranormal powers.  Strauss confronts the issue of ethical responsibility in the use of paranormal powers through the differing approaches of Aratist sects.  Can this decision be safely left up to the individual who possesses such powers?  This issue reminded me of the Deryni series by Katherine Kurtz which also focuses on whether the paranormally gifted can be trusted to use their powers ethically.  Both Strauss and Kurtz answer this question in a complex fashion.  Some individuals are more trustworthy than others, but persecution increases the likelihood of the abuse of paranormal powers because survival usually trumps ethics.    So how should societies respond to the threat of unethical use of paranormal powers?  The Burning Land shows us that there are no easy answers.

Another related issue that Strauss deals with in this book is whether religious belief makes a difference in adherence to ethics.  Again,  this varies among individuals.  In The Burning Land, people who have an internalized sense of ethics continue to be ethical even if they lose their faith.  People who are only ethical because of the expectations of their religion, will discard ethics along with their faith when catastrophic events rip their beliefs from them.  I agree that whether someone worships one deity, ten thousand deities or none isn't a determining factor when it comes to ethical behavior.

The Burning Land is a thoughtful book that I recommend to readers who are interested in compelling fantasy that addresses religion and ethical responsibility.